The precious stones are the totality of gold and silver. When in our spiritual experience we have the nature of God and the redemptive work of Christ, the result will be the transformation of the Holy Spirit. If we minister gold and silver to the saints, the issue will be precious stones, the Spirit’s transforming work. In other words, the Holy Spirit transforms us metabolically by the divine nature with the cross. In this way we become precious stones.
In chapter three Paul in effect is telling the Corinthians, “Brothers, instead of building the church in your locality, you are destroying it and tearing it down. You are not building with gold, silver, and precious stones, but with wood, grass, and stubble. You are building with your Greek natural man and your Greek culture, philosophy, wisdom, habits, and customs. Thus, you are destroying the temple of God and will suffer God’s destruction. I encourage you to take heed to avoid building with your Greek humanity and culture. You need to avoid everything Greek and be in the mingled spirit to minister the golden nature of God the Father into others and also to minister the silver of the cross of Christ. The result will be precious stones, a metabolic change produced by the transforming work of the Holy Spirit.” This is to build with the Triune God upon Christ as the unique foundation.
It is significant that Paul mentions only three categories of precious materials—gold, silver, and precious stones—for these correspond to the Three of the Triune God. The gold refers to the nature of God the Father, the silver to the redemptive work of the Son, and the precious stones to the transforming work of the Spirit. This is the experience of the Triune God becoming the supply for us to minister to the saints and the materials for the building up of the church. If we build the church with these precious materials, and not with our natural man or culture, we shall be taking heed how we build on Christ. Then our building work will not destroy the temple of God, and we shall not suffer God’s destruction.
In 3:13 Paul says, “The work of each shall become manifest; for the day shall make it known, because it is revealed by fire, and the fire itself will test each one’s work, of what sort it is.” The day here refers to the day of Christ’s second coming, when He will judge all His believers (4:5; Matt. 25:19-30; 2 Cor. 5:10; Rev. 22:12).
The fire in verse 13 denotes the fire of the Lord’s judgment (Mal. 3:2; 4:1; 2 Thes. 1:8; Heb. 6:8), which will cause each believer’s work to be manifest and will try and test his work. It is not the fire of purgatory as pervertedly interpreted by Catholicism. All the work of wood, grass, and stubble will not be able to stand that test and will be burned.
In verse 14 Paul goes on to say, “If anyone’s work which he has built upon it shall remain, he shall receive a reward.” The work that remains must be that of gold, silver, and precious stones, the product of faithful ministers of Christ. Such a work will be rewarded by the coming and judging Lord. Reward is based upon the believer’s work after being saved. It differs from salvation, which is based upon faith in the Lord and His redemptive work.